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The Rat Bastards #3
River Of Blood
If war is hell, these guys would hate heaven!
When you want to win a battle, you get real men. When you want to win a war, you get The Rat Bastards. When they’re not fighting among themselves, they’re tearing raw, living chunks out of the enemy. Nothing – not death lurking in the jungle, not the wrath of a raging river – can stop the killer squad they call…
The Rat Bastards.
When you want to win a battle, you get real men. When you want to win a war, you get The Rat Bastards. When they’re not fighting among themselves, they’re tearing raw, living chunks out of the enemy. Nothing – not death lurking in the jungle, not the wrath of a raging river – can stop the killer squad they call…
The Rat Bastards.
- GenresWarMilitary Fiction
208 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1983
4 people are currently reading
22 people want to read
About the author
Len Levinson
79 books23 followersAKA John Mackie, J. Farragut Jones, Nicholas Brady and Gordon Davis; also has ghost written as Clay Dawson.
Born in New Bedford, Massachusetts, Len Levinson served on active duty in the U.S. Army from 1954-1957, and graduated from Michigan State University with a BA in Social Science. He relocated to NYC that year and worked as an advertising copywriter and public relations executive before becoming a full-time novelist.
Len has had over eighty titles published and has created and wrote a number of series, including The Apache Wars Saga, The Pecos Kid, The Rat Bastards, and The Sergeant.
After many years in NYC, Len moved to a small town (pop. 3100) in rural Illinois, where he is now surrounded by corn and soybean fields ... a peaceful, ideal location for a writer.
Born in New Bedford, Massachusetts, Len Levinson served on active duty in the U.S. Army from 1954-1957, and graduated from Michigan State University with a BA in Social Science. He relocated to NYC that year and worked as an advertising copywriter and public relations executive before becoming a full-time novelist.
Len has had over eighty titles published and has created and wrote a number of series, including The Apache Wars Saga, The Pecos Kid, The Rat Bastards, and The Sergeant.
After many years in NYC, Len moved to a small town (pop. 3100) in rural Illinois, where he is now surrounded by corn and soybean fields ... a peaceful, ideal location for a writer.
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
March 20, 2025
This third book in the Guadalcanal World War II series is just as exciting and consistently action-packed as the previous two. Fun and many times hilarious characters rotate between Army brass as well as the Japanese enemy. Some real surprises and intense danger in this volume. Len Levinson has a real knack for writing very interesting scenarios and throws his characters into the blender and not all of them survive. I find this series one of the most pure reading experiences I've had in quite some time. Scenes move very fast and loaded with action and heroism. I'm looking forward to the next installment.
December 21, 2022
So far all of these has been a blast. They follow a ragtag group of misfits who are the recon squad and they get all the shit jobs since they always seem to come out ok. They are still on Guadalcanal, this time they are at the front of a major offensive that could decide the whole campaign on Guadalcanal, though the Japanese has a few plans of their own including a blitzkrieg like attack with tanks.
Highly recommended just fun quick reads.
Highly recommended just fun quick reads.
October 8, 2021
I just finished book 3 of the series. Man this series just keeps getting better and better. The books tend to be only 200 pages, so they are action packed quick reads. The river of blood is great because like the past two books, you get to read both sides of the war. The US and the Japanese. However; this “episode” you get to read more strategic maneuvers and a lot of chaos within the army.
November 10, 2022
These are always a fun read. One of my guilty pleasures!
September 20, 2023
As is typical of this series, the novel hits the ground running, with the squad still fighting on Guadalcanal, sneaking behind enemy lines to take out a Japanese observation post.
Later, the men take part in a major assault, crossing a river and advancing on a Japanese-held ridge. Sgt. Bannon, squad leader and one of our major point-of-view characters, nearly misses out on this. He's in the stockade for hitting an officer. But when a Japanese bomb blows a hole in the stockade fence, Bannon takes the opportunity to rejoin his buddies.
The action is brutal--gun battles that often evolve into viscious hand-to-hand combat. There's a subplot involving a Japanese general who has formed a unit of tanks and desperately wants a chance to try out the same sort of blitzkrieg assault the Germans had used in Europe. When the Americans look like they are going to break through, he might just get his chance. In the meantime, Bannon might need to take time out from combat to deal with the officer he punched out earlier in the novel.
Amidst all this, there's a number of great character moments. Perhaps the most noteworthy is a surprisingly tender moment following the death of a supporting character.
But it's the nearly non-stop action that hallmarks this book, as it does the entire series--intense, exciting and brutal.
Later, the men take part in a major assault, crossing a river and advancing on a Japanese-held ridge. Sgt. Bannon, squad leader and one of our major point-of-view characters, nearly misses out on this. He's in the stockade for hitting an officer. But when a Japanese bomb blows a hole in the stockade fence, Bannon takes the opportunity to rejoin his buddies.
The action is brutal--gun battles that often evolve into viscious hand-to-hand combat. There's a subplot involving a Japanese general who has formed a unit of tanks and desperately wants a chance to try out the same sort of blitzkrieg assault the Germans had used in Europe. When the Americans look like they are going to break through, he might just get his chance. In the meantime, Bannon might need to take time out from combat to deal with the officer he punched out earlier in the novel.
Amidst all this, there's a number of great character moments. Perhaps the most noteworthy is a surprisingly tender moment following the death of a supporting character.
But it's the nearly non-stop action that hallmarks this book, as it does the entire series--intense, exciting and brutal.
June 30, 2014
More war stories from Guadalcanal WWII 1942-43.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews